Anglo-Swedish group AstraZeneca plans to have its first manufacturing base in Ireland operational in Dublin by 2025 in a further boost to the country’s life sciences sector.

Companies like Hines and Harrison Street are targeting Dublin as a city with the potential to develop new life sciences real estate.

AstraZeneca announced plans last year for the construction of its first manufacturing plant in Ireland, with a $360M investment that AstraZeneca Executive Vice President, Operations and IT Pam Cheng said will provide the business with future supply chain flexibility.

While the pharma giant has had a long-term marketing presence in the Irish market, it has not previously manufactured in the country.

However, with the €39.5B deal to acquire U.S. company Alexion in 2020, it bought into a company that has invested more than €600M at sites in Dublin’s College Park in Blanchardstown and Athlone.

“As a result of Alexion joining AstraZeneca, Ireland is becoming really a strategic hub for AstraZeneca,” Cheng told the Irish Times.

The design of the new plant is still subject to planning approval but initially AstraZeneca plans to have the capacity on-site for the development and early stage commercialisation of three drugs simultaneously.

Alongside further investment in Alexion’s Irish sites, the project will bring the group’s investment in Ireland to more than €1.2B to date, and Cheng said that she is confident of delivering the site for regulatory clearance and operations by early 2025.

The facility will feature the latest in digitally enabled production and will be “quite unique and innovative” according to the company.

Cheng said that while development of new medicines normally starts in a “small-scale, lab-heavy” development facility before transferring to commercial-scale manufacture, the Dublin facility will house both development and commercialisation.

This will allow the company to focus on speed of delivery for a new medicine and, once established commercially, it will be transferred to another site, with the Dublin space freed for other pipeline products.

The building’s modular design will enable expansion of production lines to produce additional drugs if needed.